Ne-Yo - Shot Down

A chart-topping R&B heavyweight approaching a female and getting Shot Down? Inconceivable! As Ne-Yo explains on this new joint, the first in producer Boola‘s new online-only series, he was as shocked as anyone when a shawty at the local spot rebuffed his advances. Over the beatsmith’s bouncing percussion, synth stabs and pizzicato strings, the singer soulfully turns club-music cliché upside-down. While the story starts innocuously enough, with Ne-Yo swilling (and occasionally spilling) expensive liquors at the bar, things quickly go awry; instead of transforming him into an unflappable ladies’ man, all that booze just makes him… well… drunk – and, when he approaches the chick he’s hoping to take home, she sees right through his sloppy, self-important game-spitting. The fact that the otherwise-gentlemanly crooner’s playing the fool here doesn’t stop him from turning in a top-notch vocal performance, and the result is a cut as ear-pleasing as its concept is clever. The singer’s fourth LP, Libra Scale, is set to drop Nov. 22. In the meantime, fans should check back with us for future entries in Boola’s aptly-named Produced by Boola series.